CarolVAN DER VEER

VAN DER VEER, CAROL HAMILTON 62, passed away on April 10 in Pittsburgh, PA after a long battle with cancer. Throughout her life, Hamilton worked actively towards creating a better society, with a special concern for the poor and working classes, human rights, animal welfare, and the environment. She was an avid cyclist and swimmer. She loved literature, film, photography, classical, rock and folk music, travel, all languages, especially English, German, French, Russian and Swedish, and relished a good literary, philosophical or political discussion. She had a fascination with genealogy, the Age of Enlightenment, and anarchism. She greatly admired Mark Twain and whole heartedly agreed with him that "A home without a cat-and a well-fed, well-petted and properly revered cat-may be a perfect home, perhaps, but how can it prove title?" Carol earned a B.A. with honors in Comparative Literature from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, an M.A. in German from the University of California-Irvine, an M.F.A. in Creative Writing from Vermont College, and a Ph.D, in English from the University of California, Berkeley. She published a wide range of writing, including scholarly articles, arts reviews, op-ed pieces, two chapbooks of poetry, and poems in many literary journals, among them The North American Review, Poetry Miscellany, Salmagundi and The Paris Review. A book of poems, "Blindsight," was published in 2005 by Carnegie Mellon University Press. Always fascinated by her distant relative Alexander Hamilton, Carol wrote "A Natural Aristocrat," a screenplay about Mr. Hamilton that was a semifinalist in the Academy of Motion Pictures annual screenplay competition. A lifelong academic and devoted teacher, Carol was most recently a lecturer at the University of Pittsburgh. Prior to the University of Pittsburgh, she served as an assistant professor at Carnegie Mellon University and as a visiting assistant professor at the University of Oregon, Eugene. She grew up in Birmingham, Alabama. The daughter of the late Lowell S. Hamilton, Carol is survived by her mother, Virginia Van der Veer Hamilton, brother, David Hamilton, and nephew Alexander V. Hamilton. A memorial service will be held in Pittsburgh, PA on Sunday, April 21 at 2 pm in the Rachel Mellon Walton Room, Posner Hall, Margaret Morrison entrance, Carnegie Mellon University. In lieu of flowers, the family suggests memorial contributions be sent to Animal Friends, 562 Camp Horne Road, Pittsburgh, PA, 15237.